Critical, Biographical, and Psychiatric Lenses of Virginia Woolf's Biography and Related Literature

This project is valuable because it considers three out of the many diverse voices on Woolf. Like other researchers, I have to decide which analysis of her I view as most accurate. In presenting the values and limitations to these three approaches to studying her, I am contributing to the broader understanding of Virginia Woolf. What follows are chapters discussing the critical, biographical, and psychiatric lenses of viewing Woolf, approaches that were chosen because they consider how her mental illness and literature relate to each other. I critique and acknowledge the strengths and weaknesses that come with each lens. With the critical approach, I examine the characteristics of headnotes: how the genre gives context to the reader about both the writer’s biography and literary accomplishments, but ultimately, how the Norton headnotes speaks towards Woolf in a more reductive way than it uses when discussing male writers with similar histories. Using the Norton headnote as an example of literary criticism on Woolf does not mean that it is representative of all literary criticism about her. Rather, headnotes exist almost as their own subgenre and can provide an example of how her biography and literature are paired together. With the biographical approach, I consider the way Woolf’s personality and history are presented holistically by Lee, but also how her failure to draw definite conclusions leaves readers wanting more. In the psychiatric approach, I consider how Dr. Thomas Szasz argues that Woolf’s symptoms were used to manipulate those around her. Ultimately, however, I discuss how he refuses to consider all of the evidence available when making these claims about Woolf.Bachelor of Art